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CNN host Brianna Keilar confronted Representative Mike Turner, an Ohio Republican, on Sunday after Donald Trump‘s social media platform, Truth Social, promoted an article that publicly released the names of the FBI agents who were involved in the raid of his Mar-a-Lago resort residence earlier this week.
Truth Social reportedly sent a push alert on Friday to promote an article by Breibart, a conservative website, that included an unredacted version of the search warrant, which revealed the names of two FBI agents, CNN correspondent Donie O’Sullivan reported.
“How is that not encouraging violence against federal law enforcement officers in this climate to identify them?” Keilar asked the congressman on State of the Union, citing an incident in which Navy veteran Ricky Shiffer tried to breach an FBI office with an AR-15 rifle in Cincinnati on Thursday and ended up being killed. A Truth Social account under the same name allegedly shared messages about attacking the FBI in the wake of the Mar-a-Lago raid.
Trump’s social media platform sent a push alert this afternoon to an article with an unredacted version of the search warrant that included the names of two FBI agents.
Those agents’ names are now circulating on pro-Trump social media and are being villainized.
— Donie O’Sullivan (@donie) August 12, 2022
“Obviously, I don’t know who you’re referring to on social media. But…members of Congress have condemned, and I did, and all of the Republican members of my committee jointly…condemned any violence against any law enforcement officers,” Turner responded during the heated exchange with Keilar. “We greatly appreciate the service of all of our FBI agents, men and women, who are serving their nation.”
When repeatedly asked whether or not Trump should also condemn attacks against law enforcement, Turner said, “I think always everyone should make it very clear that this is not an issue where violence is ever an answer. I think you should make it very clear this is not something that should rise to the level of violence.”
Turner continued to defend Trump against the FBI raid, and said that “the FBI has a history before of using bogus information.”
Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Keilar asked him again whether or not the ex-president should condemn violence against law enforcement the same way members of Congress did. Turner continued to say that Congress members condemn all violence against any law enforcement. At one point, he addressed the article ID’ing the FBI agents, and said that he didn’t “know who said that.”
Keilar told the congressman: “I’m saying Breitbart reported it. His [Trump’s] social media network put it out.”
Towards the end of the segment, Turner demanded that Attorney General Merrick Garland “show us the goods” that would justify the raid.
The lawmaker’s remarks come after Garland approved an FBI search warrant to retrieve top secret (TS) and sensitive compartmentalized information (SCI) at Trump’s residence. Recovered documents reportedly included information related to nuclear weapons and “highly classified programs.” Meanwhile, some legal experts said that Trump is suspected of being in violation of the Espionage Act for keeping those documents.
On Friday, Trump said that the raid was unnecessary, that he had been cooperating with authorities in the investigation, and that he had declassified all the documents.
“Number one, it was all declassified. Number two, they didn’t need to “seize” anything. They could have had it anytime they wanted without playing politics and breaking into Mar-a-Lago,” the ex-president wrote on Truth Social.
Newsweek reached out to Trump’s media office for comment.
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